Transportation currently takes up around a third of overall energy usage, of which the majority is petroleum-based gasoline. Petroleum is both a finite resource and a big contributor to the carbon emissions that are causing climate change. To continue to benefit from transportation whilst mitigating climate change it is essential to find alternatives to petroleum-based gasoline. Although a lot of recent developments have focused on electrifying transport the infrastructure for large scale uptake of electric vehicles is still lacking and it may be less practical in some parts of the world than others. Biofuels, therefore, still have a role to play in improving the sustainability of our transportation systems.
The term green gasoline refers to biofuels intended to be direct drop-in replacements for petroleum-based gasoline. Such products allow vehicles to run on biofuel without any engine modifications and, being made from biomass, they are both renewable and have a better carbon emission profile than petroleum-based gasoline.
Green Gasoline covers a range of new technologies being used to produce these biofuels and compares them to petroleum-based fuels in terms of sustainability. It will be an interesting read for those working in fuel chemistry as well as green chemists and anyone with an interest in transport sustainability.
About the Author: Dr Mohammad Aslam is an Assistant Professor at Department of Chemistry, National Institute of Technology, Srinagar (J&K). He received his first master's degree in "Industrial Chemistry" from Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, followed by MTech in "Fuels and Combustion" from Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra, Ranchi and a PhD in Chemistry from National Institute of Technology, Jalandhar. Dr Aslam has also worked as Post-Doctoral Fellow/Research Associate in Chemical Conversion Division, Sardar Swaran Singh National Institute of Bio-energy), Punjab. His current research is focusing on green transportation fuels derived from second/third generation biomass feedstocks and their application for decarbonizing transportation sector.
Dr Shrikant Shivaji Maktedar is an Assistant Professor at Department of Chemistry, National Institute of Technology, Srinagar, J&K. Dr Maktedar received his B.Sc. Degree in Chemistry and M.Sc. Degree in Physical Chemistry from Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Marathwada University, Aurangabad, Maharashtra. He completed his Ph.D. at Central University of Gujarat, Gandhinagar. Over the last 10 years, Dr Maktedar has been working in the field of carbonaceous materials with emphasis on their multifunctional applications.
Dr Anil Kumar Sarma holds an an MSc Chemistry (Gauhati University, 1997), M Tech in Energy Technology (Tezpur University, 2002) and PhD in Energy (Tezpur University, 2006) with specialization in Bioenergy. Dr Sarma has worked as a research associate in IIT Guwahati and visiting researcher at Seikei University, Japan. Dr Sarma is a Scientist- E at Sardar Swaran Singh National Institute of Bio-Energy, Kapurthala. He has ongoing research projects ongoing for biomass characterization for power plant applications as a substitute of coal. His research interests include activated carbon production from waste biomass such as corncob, carbon conversion to grapheme, and uses for fuel cell electrode fabrication, super capacitor applications and more.
